


Brown Eyed Seraph

by graphesthesia



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, First Love, Friends With Benefits, Jealousy, Lots of it, Unrequited Love, best friends with benefits
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-11
Updated: 2018-04-11
Packaged: 2019-04-21 10:50:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14283315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/graphesthesia/pseuds/graphesthesia
Summary: She wants to be a capitalized word on a page, not lowercase and unfinished.





	Brown Eyed Seraph

Names have savage power. Words as fickle or as measly as they are having the ability to change, to create, to define and limit and negate.

A single letter is stronger than all the swords that are polished and cut to perfection in the world, mightier than even the most powerful of kings and tyrants, as great as the Divine themselves. A letter shapes and brings the unsaid into creation. A letter erases the wondrous world, it is merciless. It is violent. It reduces the blue planet to nothing, rendering once-vibrant plains grey as ash and cinders that are blown away by the wind and the sun the epitome of warmth into a lusterless, pallid thing.

And yet a single letter is enough to also tame a sinner whose heart has been tainted with anger, sadness and grief, it changes his beliefs which turns him into someone good, appreciated, and pure. A letter is capable of giving happiness and love. It is forgiving. Benevolent. It gives a child born out of hate and lust, a home which she grows up to be needed and cared for, it gives even the most broken heart to learn how to trust and let go again.

Which reigns triumphant? The power to capitalize and _make_ or the power to write only in lowercase and _destroy_?

Lowercase is the half-capitalized state of the universe, the not-formed, the unborn, and the still-breathing fetus.

Lowercase is destiny not yet cemented in the halls of Jeremiah.

In the halls of the Creator, he resides there with angels and cherubs. You will find yourself in alcove that parts beyond the heavens, for the heavens. A scholar’s room. He is the divine author of the world. He is inventive. Writing the multitudes with a pen fashioned from metal and wood, the ink becomes the flesh and blood of the masses down below. Words are his children. The creator is a doting father whose laugh is loud, eyes wrinkling and teeth showing; forever in love with the words that stay true to their ideals, but like any other children, words also rebel, they crush and prey. They struck the creator harshly; they make him sad, his eyes tear up, eyes not looking anyone in the eye and lips trembling. Some words taste like ashes on the tip of his sacred tongue.

Jeremiah has finished his book with two capitalized lives entertained together. A happy ending together. The angels were always chastising him for such dreary ends and he complied. He is done drafting the plotline of his new work. He makes a part of the trilogy that makes his other writings fall like a stack of cards.

There is a girl whose eyes shine with mirth and cleverness, born into capitalization, she who dares to be her own scribe, to write her name in lowercase lettering, ink containing algorithms and motherboards splashing across the white pages. Words in black and white. The unformed. To defy her writer, to prove that she is more than a willing character to be manipulated and pulled apart.

There is a boy, who was destined to become another capitalized legend. He follows it. A myriad of lust, hard work and longing. His ink is not in black and white. It is a shade of blue. Triumphant and Complete. His boundaries always tested, whether on his ability to land a ball precisely to the other side of the court by his right hand or on his ability to please a woman with his other.  He is contented with the hands of Jeremiah the creator; he himself is pleased with the boy.

And then, there is another girl with her smile full of warmth and acceptance. Jeremiah does not know how to pen her. She is gray. She does not create, nor does she destroy. She nurtures.  The creator makes endless moments in her part, her endings are not finished and yet she is complete; her body is immortalized in a bottle of wine while her soul is the carving in the hearts of capitalized men.

(They make a story that lies between the Stratum and the Octaves.)

* * *

 

The golden boy of the capitalized world has sealed his fate. He now has two roads that lie before him. _Only_ for him. One path that is painted with untainted angels and bountiful blessings. His heart does not waver. He looks to the other path, smeared with ruthless devils and insatiable lust. His heart does not waver.

Jeremiah’s commands are swift and He wonders what the boy does next.   
  
The golden boy falters. Down the different roads at the end of them are different girls. The one who desires to make her own pages and the girl who does not exist in the halls of holy.

The golden boy decides for himself. He is used to staggering and difficult choices. He has chosen between life and death of a lowercased being after all.

Jeremiah nods and bestows him the power to choose. He gives him a pen to make his line. Timothy does not make a line for one path. He does two. He makes the creator heartily laugh.

 

The righteous path opens for him first and he finds himself as a pudgy kid holding the arm of his big brother, his brother who is destined for the capitalized world as well, then again outside of the tall figure the other adults watching their children who are playing on monkey bars or see-saws they all seem so bleak to him, blurred lines and blurred planes.

All except for a tiny little girl alone in one swing. The rest of the world is black and white, and she was screaming color.                                        

He doesn’t know what to say to her but she looks up from the ground and her doll shoes; she smiles at him and his cheeks flush red.

He can hear his brother hiding a chuckle and the little boy wonders if she is just another kid passing by his life. Except he felt himself tug on his brother’s sweater.

“Kuya...can I go there to that pretty girl?” his big brother nods and takes him to the swing where the girl was sitting on; he ruffled his little brother’s hair and asked him to introduce himself to the girl.  
  
Puffing his chest out and trying to look cool or he thinks that’s what the word was and spoke loudly almost startling the girl “I’m Timothy Mendoza.” He put out his chubby hand to the girl “And you are?”

“Karina…Karina De Villa.”

He started stuttering, the golden boy was shy as a kid and that makes Jeremiah above the clouds laugh “I wanna see you again!”

She smiled even wider “Why not? I’m always alone here.”

As a young boy he promised to never leave her, so every 4 o clock he goes to the swing set day by day, and he gets to hear Karina laugh and talk endlessly, so he can see her face all delighted, speaking like they’re the only people on the playground and going on and on about the most weirdest things.

(He swears she had seen the same face somewhere else. The girl at the then end of the road also had kind eyes and a beautiful smile.)

* * *

 

Timothy Mendoza as a kid had decided to meet both of the women at the end of the roads.

It was summer and they are in a big village. Mama lets him go out and enjoy the sun, she kisses him on the forehead and he hugs her. A mama’s boy all throughout his life. His papa says goodbye and ruffles his hair and Tim laughs.

He has been walking along the streets when he found a villa looming over him; it’s as big as their house in Antipolo, and a girl on a porch. He sat down and he notices she’s been playing something on the game boy advance. He scooted closer to her and began to search in his little bag for his own gba.

“What version of Pokémon are you playing?” He looked at the screen of the handheld console and saw a Venasaur on it. He widely grins, eyes sparkling with mirth, he was excited! He wanted to finally trade someone a Growlithe for a Vulpix and name it Naruto.

The girl in question looked at the boy and blushed coyly. Daddy said not to talk to strangers, but maybe he wasn’t dangerous because he isn’t a big kid like daddy “The leaf green one.” Her reply was short; she looked at her sprite that was currently standing on a tile of tall grass

“Do you have a Vulpix?” Timothy hands were fists on his side; he was always an eager child. “I want to name him Naruto!” and unfortunately rambly “Hmm, maybe you don’t know who Naruto is.”

She pouted at him “I know who Naruto Uzumaki is!” She exclaimed “You’re a stranger so I won’t talk to you anymore.”

Extending his hand out to the girl and started to talk again “I’ m Timothy Jacob C. Mendoza!” maybe introducing himself with let her think his not a stranger anymore, “And you are?” He insisted as he gripped her hand.

“Jamaisah Jurilla.” She looked at their hands and realized how warm they were, “But you can call me Jamie.”

Getting a connector from his bag, he hooked it up both of their gbas

“There!” he almost screamed as he opened the Pokémon game “We’re friends now Jamie!” and he smiled at her so bright as befitting for his title as the golden boy of the capitalized world.

* * *

 

(In his dreams he himself down the two roads Timothy swears up and down Jamie looks like the woman on the end of the left side, the same thin lips and expressive eyes. He is standing in the middle line he wrote that connects the both of them; his pulse quickening and his heart threatening to jump out of his chest. So he pleads to the Creator for just one thing, if anything just one thing.

“To be with the both of them.” And if anything Jeremiah more than complies)

* * *

 

At the end of summer, he had to say goodbye to both of them and to the humble village, he promised them nothing else but going to see them again. And in a span of years, he grew up as a coveted dream of the girls around him. He was a lot of things; athletic, charismatic, handsome and rich. He has achieved scholarships, medals and trophies.

Jeremiah’s name for the young boy had him immortalized whether it is in volleyball, playing the guitar or in his academics. You see him and you see light in all different forms. A mark of the capitalized. He is a raging torrent of flames and sparks ready to devour and consume everything in his path. They see him as a ruthless force. No one can stop him from imprinting his life unto awards and opportunities, yet they also see him as a candle. A guide for empty souls lost on a battlefield of spikes and throws lost in empty worlds.

He was going to be like his brother, Tiang. Another capitalized legend. A lawyer and a husband who never forgets to talk to Timothy when he was frustrated by his misgivings. Successful. But he was never going to be like his brother, life almost ruined by men and their liquor, dependent on drugs, smoking a cigarette. Then a woman came along, simple and hailing from the rice paddies of Nueva Ecija. She saved his brother and salvaged the older man’s pathetic life. She gave him a new beginning so he became her new dream.

At a young age, Timothy was of course loved by both of his parents even if they have to work in this big conglomerate, it doesn’t matter anyway, they will always Sunday to look forward to. His older sister Andrea who only uses makeup and styling tools from them, she taught him everything he has to know for taking care of a girl. His faults were being corrected every time from his dear Nanang Rosa.

He wanted to know what a girl’s love is.

When he started his tenth grade, his friends who usually who study together on the library, shout each other on and exercise and play together, went to a bar using fake i.ds and passes, the first time he was there his friends spoiled him with drinks and that’s where he discovered he had a great tolerance for alcohol.  There he also met his first girlfriend Elisah. He first had sex with her and he realized something. He loves being dominant, he feels good and aroused seeing someone under him, asking for more.

The golden boy is a lover. He has been with women older than him. He has lost count of the many sighs and moans he had swallowed or the lips he had kissed and bitten. He fucked more than he made love. Women who had been lucky to be with him never found a note or a call, just messy sheets that reek of sex and sweat. Their faces are a blur in his mind; sometimes he remembers a red lip or a tight skirt, sometimes he forgets their name or calls them another…not that he ever bothered to get them right anyway. On just nights of pure insatiable lust, he does not even get their name.

* * *

 

He gets one of his longtime girlfriends, Kyla pregnant. The thought makes him sick, the little baby was a lowercased being, a supposed artist like his father and mother.

But that never happened.

The next day she wakes up in Timothy’s room in the summer house in a quaint village. The space next to her is cold and empty, she is wearing his shirt. There is a note of “I’ll be back :) “on the tableside alongside a glass of cold orange juice and pills. Her eyes started watering and she feels like her heart is getting broken. _She just took a life away_. Bitterness rises in her throat, bile threatening to spill through her teeth. She clenches her mouth and forces the vomit back down. His taste still lingers in her mouth and there’s now an invisible reminder of a faint heartbeat in her womb.

She sees him down in their garden, with a makeshift grave, a cross, and lilacs. His left cheek barring an imprint. A slap. And on the other with a bruised complexion. A punch.

She kisses him with fervor, needy and desperate, her hands tugging at his hair and she feels his tears mingling with hers. She decides to end this, to leave him. For his sake and for her sake…for their unborn child’s sake.

* * *

 

Timothy meets Karina again, except it’s not like a wish from a fairytale. He meets her in a room with a timer and chessboard. He lets her have the white pieces yet she refused, he raised his brow at her first move for his own is moving a sacrificial pawn in front. “The knight?” he asked, legs shifting to form a de kwatro. He put his chin in his hand and waited for a reply from the lovely girl. He realized she was no longer flat as a board and her face has become more smooth and flawless.

“Some innocent people are worth fighting for.”

They ended up in a tie, and he ended up being curious about how he is blushing like a mad schoolgirl.

He finds himself wanting her. So he asks permission to court her from everyone in her family. He takes her out to simple carenderias to restaurants, from movies to theaters. He wants to know her better, to know why she doesn’t like returning to her home, or what is it like in Barcelona? He even wants to ask her how the wine her name was on came to be. He wanted to entwine her life to hers.

(But there was one thing; she was not yet willing to give. One of the pleasures he desires. Her body)

\--

He sees Jamie again through a silver screen of monsters and mages. Timothy is a seasoned gamer armed with skills and tactics, he never thought the player on the other side was the precocious girl he had met ages ago, but it assures him. When they meet again on the porch of her house, his palms are cool and just looking at her. He is not fumbling or stuttering and he looks like he found something he had lost once.

(He doesn’t know what is anymore but he knows it must have been very important)

They started again as casual players who are talking about their games, well up until he saw her frustrated, lips trembling and body shaking; the tears streaking down on her cheeks showed no signs in stopping.

“Mommy is leaving us.” She murmured into his shirt as he hugged her

“If it makes you feel better I won’t.”

She laughs a bit crudely and thanks him. From that day onward, she had confided in him. He knows about her family and how they smother her with lively affection. Her mother was in abroad, rarely contacting them anymore, when Jamie said that to him the air became cold and bitter, never wanted her to feel that way ever again. But she was really close to her father, being there with her first period and first crush, Timothy refers him as business man and inside joke with Jamie that he is part of the mafia due to his connections.

There was JN, a rambunctious yet sweet sibling. He likes to tease the both of them very much saying that they will be together and get married. Timothy doesn’t want to admit it however that he smiles whenever he thinks it may happen.

Finally James who was another capitalized legend, he plays the piano and is just as good as him academically, (he should know considering they are classmates and graduated as both valedictorians). Jamie was always been compared to him, on why she chose to discard out her capitalism. A silent middle finger pointed to the powerful Jeremiah. Timothy will never compare to Jamaisah to anyone, even to the woman of his dreams, to her cousin.

* * *

 

In Jamie’s eyes, everything with Timothy was all right, she finds herself wishing time would just stop and let her bask in his warmth, his mischievous stares, and strong arms. She has lost count he pulled her closer to him, lips on her forehead. The scribe of her own faith falters. She has denied everything the Creator has given to her. Except for one thing. Except for Timothy Mendoza.

Her heart breaks when she hears his scream as he enters his room, she was on his bed covered in his sheets, he then plopped down on his bed and got the old gba they used to play as kids, he was using a Ninetales now, the one that evolved from the Vulpix that she traded him for. Jamie then observes him; he is pressing the buttons fast, fingers tapping nonstop at the console. It means that he had another screaming match with his dear mother and he is now regretting every word he has said to Miss Joanna; she can see the tears in the corner of his eyes.

He has been hiding the world his pain and sadness and loneliness, so when he pulls him closer to her, he hugs her back and she can feel the fabric on her shoulder getting soaked with his tears. She whispers a small "i love you" to him, she doesn't know if he has heard but he grips her tighter, his game forgotten and Jamie thinks that is enough.

She finds herself writing his name over and over --- on scraps of paper that held her algorithms and equations, in books of the textbooks she has read and on the back of her palms or wrists. The now lowercased flower carved the golden boy's name like sacred markings into trees and the tops of her thighs.

She is not blind when she notices the little stares he gives her cousin or the little gifts that he gives Karina. She tries to hide the jealousy, the green-eyed monster will not get the best her, but when she sees the now big Arcanine in her team she thinks of him, when she tastes the delicate yet strong flavor of Belgian cakes, she thinks of him. She sees the word "what if" and she thinks of him. The green-eyed monster is trying to get out of her.

(The golden boy is with her in an arena and in the eye of the hurricane there is quiet; the calm before the storm happens, he gives his best friend, a charm of gold with an infinity sign, a pendant for everything they had shared together. The metal burns into her skin and ultimately in her heart forever.)

She had lain with him during the nights he was courting his dear and sweet and naive cousin. They never had sex or make love even; Timothy doesn't even kiss her lips. His eyes are dark and watchful, his jaw smooth and sharp. She knows this is wrong; having an affair with the boy, no she meant the man his cousin has given her heart. But when he kisses and nips her neck leaving a bruise that will make her wear a scarf to school, when his fingers touch her under her skirt and make her moan out his name and makes her beg and plead for release she speaks this litany to ease her mind, to ease her heart.

_"She has his heart but I have his body."_  She is selfish, taking what she wants and calling it hers.

Ask her if she loves him, the golden boy who left silver scars on her back. She has burned for him, drowned for him and she fell for him. Fell from the heavens themselves. So ask her if she loves him, and when this mortal ichor flows from the raw wounds at her shoulders, do not be surprised. Ask her if she loves him, so when these saltwater tears cascade and her lungs fill with something that is not air let these burns remind you of how much she craves his touch.

(At the end he chooses the girl on the path of the righteous but he never dares to leave her. He doesn’t. He stays)

She wanted him to love her, to cherish her. She wanted to step out from the damned shadow of her charming cousin, and be herself, be more than a pawn, more than just the _other_ girl. She never wanted it to end like this. Never like this

_Fuck them. Fuck them all._

In the end, she's just a little girl writing a bad story, where everything is lowercase and unfulfilled. Empty lust for empty hearts.

Ink splatters onto her hands like blood.

* * *

 

The Creator sighs and mourns for his lost child. She had such great plans but she denied each and every one except for her boy. So He turns the paper gently so that the readers will know He is not angry with the girl and starts a new. But He makes them know that He will not return to her story or let her live in his other books, He erases her from the narrative. She will only be mentioned, by her dear cousin or a doting fan. But other than that He sees no more words for the now lowercased being. And He is terribly sorry.

He gives all her roles to her unformed cousin. Karina De Villa now has something she can proudly show. She is punctuation. A new form beauty. She dots stories with emotion, subtle pauses and moments of silence; she makes his book complete. Jeremiah stands up from his seat and gets a new book again.

She will also make another book; along with the golden boy. But for now, Jeremiah closes the lights and leaves his room.

(end.)

 


End file.
